In a previous blog post on “The Three Ways: The Principles Underpinning DevOps”, I wrote the underpinning principles in which all the DevOps patterns can be derived from. They describe the values and philosophies that frame the processes, procedures, practices, as well as the prescriptive steps. In this post, I’m going to describe some of the elements of the First Way, which will allude to some of the DevOps patterns that result from its application. The First Way emphasizes … [Read more...]
Can Agile, Lean and/or TOC Solve The Inherent Complexities of Global Engineering?
This is a guest post by Curtis Hill (LinkedIn Profile) During the last 20 years or so the practice of pairing US and European based software engineering teams with teams from all over the globe has exploded. I have worked with teams all over the world for the last 15 years and I have found it to be a wonderful experience overall from both professional and personal perspectives. That having been said when a business executive asks me what working with global teams means from a software … [Read more...]
The Three Ways: The Principles Underpinning DevOps
In this blog post, I talk about the "Three Ways," which are the principles that all of the DevOps patterns can be derived from, which we're using in both the “DevOps Handbook” and "The Phoenix Project: A Novel About IT, DevOps, and Helping Your Business Win." We assert that the Three Ways describe the values and philosophies that frame the processes, procedures, practices of DevOps, as well as the prescriptive steps. It has been especially fun working on this with fellow co-author Mike Orzen, … [Read more...]
Japanese Terms For DevOps Practitioners
Gemba The Japanese meaning is "the real place". In business it typically means “where value is created” and in lean manufacturing it means “the factory or shop floor”. In Lean Six Sigma (LSS) it is common to hear the phrase “Going to Gemba” (meaning the real place where the work is being done). This is also sometimes referred to as process mapping. The reason this is an important word in terms of DevOps is that DevOps inherits a lot of ideas from LSS and the “Theory of Constraints” … [Read more...]
Fighting Waste With DevOps: The 7 + 2 Types Of IT Waste
Much has been written about the 7 wastes found in manufacturing and office environments. These wastes were originally identified in the Toyota Production System over 50 years ago. However, there is a common lack of understanding when it comes to the best use of these definitions and their application in the world of software development, deployment and subsequent service. First let’s define the original 7 wastes (aka Seven Deadly Sins): 1. Overproduction – Creating more code, features and … [Read more...]
Nick Galbreath On Integrating Information Security Into DevOps
I had the pleasure of meeting Nick Galbreath (@ngalbreath) at the SxSW Interactive conference this year. He’s especially memorable to me in much the same way Josh Corman and James Wickett are. What they all have in common is that they believe that DevOps may be the best thing that’s happened to information security in a very long time. Nick is an information security practitioner who not only sees the value of DevOps-style practices to information security, but also lives and breathes it. … [Read more...]
DevOps Culture (Part 2)
Over the past few years I have interviewed hundreds of DevOps practitioners and I have also attended around 30 or more DevOps meetups around the globe. This included with my own experience has enabled me to come up with a good list of what I will call patterns of DevOps Kaizen habits. The following is a list of patterns of Kaizen habits. Communication Sounds like it should be the easiest of all patterns. Of course, it isn’t. There have been many great books on this subject by people … [Read more...]
DevOps Culture (Part 1)
After the first US based Devopsdays in Mountainview 2010 Damon Edwards (@damonedwards) and I coined the acronym CAMS, which stands for Culture, Automation, Measurement and Sharing. Jez Humble (@jezhumble) later added an L, standing for Lean, to form CALMS. In this post I wanted to start with an introduction and overview of what culture might look like in the DevOps movement and identify some patterns. Patrick Debois, (@patrickdebois) godfather of the DevOps movement, always says DevOps is a … [Read more...]
@Botchagalupe and @Cote at Devopsdays Austin
Michael Cote (@cote) and I recently met up at DevOpsDays Austin, and, naturally, a video interview ensued. We jokingly talked about getting the band back together and maybe starting up our old IT Management podcast series. For those of you who remember, we stopped recording after Michael left RedMonk and went to Dell. As you’ll see, it didn't take long for us to get back into a great rhythm. In this video we talked about some of the conclusions made in Michael's DevOpsDays Austin … [Read more...]
The Convergence of DevOps
I'd like to describe how DevOps is the culmination of three amazing and significant movements. This is what we're putting into the DevOps Cookbook [later retitled The DevOps Handbook]. So the saying goes “If I could have a nickel for every time I have heard the expression "Cloud? We've been doing that for 20 years!” I would be a ...” So goes DevOps. The funny thing is that most people are right in saying "we've been doing DevOps for years." That's mainly because there is not good … [Read more...]
